The subject of the present invention is an installation for ventilation in a building comprising several housing units. The term housing unit is to be understood in the broadest sense, and can refer just as easily to housing units for dwelling as to other premises, for example those for use as offices.
To carry out air quality treatment, the most conventional solution consists in using single-flow controlled mechanical ventilation. A ventilation unit placed, for example, on the roof of the building, extracts air from the functional quarters, such as kitchens and bathrooms, of the various housing units, while the air is admitted to the living quarters of the various housing units via air inlets placed, for example, in the door or window frames. These air inlets may give rise to acoustic disturbances because they allow noise from the outside to pass and may lead to thermal discomfort in winter, in that they let cold air in. As there is no possibility of recuperating energy on the renewal of air, the ventilation is therefore a significant source of heat loss.
Another known solution relates to double-flow ventilating systems. In this case, there is a ventilation unit blowing air taken from outside the building into the living quarters (drawing rooms, bedrooms, etc.) of the various housing units, and a ventilation unit, having the same characteristics as the blowing unit, extracting the air from the functional quarters (kitchens, bathrooms, etc.) of the various housing units. Individual static air-air exchangers may be arranged at each housing unit or at the ventilation units to preheat the blown-in air using the extracted air. The thermal balance is therefore better than that of a single flow installation because energy is recuperated from the extracted air. Furthermore, the problems of acoustic disturbance are eliminated because there are no air inlets placing each room of the living quarters in communication with the outside.
Increasingly, the problem of year-round heat treatment of the air also arises.
A first solution consists in individual air conditioning systems each comprising an external unit and an internal unit operating with recirculation. Such a system, which is completely independent of the ventilation, is very demanding from the point of view of installing it, because it is necessary to provide an external unit and a refrigerant fluid network. Aside from the high cost of production, such an installation may also cause acoustic disturbances with a unit on the outside and a blower on the inside of the housing unit, and for the same reasons may prove to be visually unattractive.
Another solution consists in providing a communal external unit connected either to a communal cold battery placed on the blowing network or to individual units placed in the housing units and operating with recirculation. This solution, aside from its lack of flexibility, is not used nowadays in housing units intended for dwellings because it poses problems regarding regulations, the metering of energy per apartment, and losses in the pipes.
The invention provides an installation for ventilation and heat treatment of air in a building comprising several housing units, which is of simple and modifiable structure.
To this end, the installation to which the invention relates, of the type comprising a double flow ventilation system with a ventilation unit blowing air taken from outside the building into the living quarters: drawing rooms, bedrooms, etc. of the various housing units, and a ventilation unit, having the same characteristics as the blowing unit, performing air extraction from the functional quarters: kitchens, bathrooms, etc. of the air blown into the functional quarters, the air being conveyed to and extracted from each housing unit via ducts communal to the building, is characterized in that it comprises, at the connection of each housing unit to a pair of ducts, these being, respectively, a blowing duct and an extraction duct, an individual thermodynamic unit dedicated to the housing unit in question and over which the ventilation airflow passes, the evaporator and the condenser of this unit being arranged one on the blowing flow and one on the extraction flow, respectively.
Advantageously, the thermodynamic unit is housed in a casing comprising at least two compartments each equipped with an air inlet and with an air outlet and respectively containing the evaporator and the condenser of the thermodynamic unit.
According to one implementation of this installation, the evaporator of the thermodynamic unit is arranged on the flow of air blown into the housing unit, and the condenser is arranged on the flow of air extracted from the housing unit.
The installation according to the invention therefore comprises communal ventilation units and individual thermodynamic subassemblies and pipes without blowers. The individual thermodynamic subassemblies are installed on the communal air loop, which provides communal double flow controlled mechanical ventilation for the building.
The installation according to the invention therefore makes it possible to manage overall air quality in each housing unit by providing the regulation air renewal flow rates and filtering the blown-in air. In addition to this air quality management, the installation allows personalized heat treatment by producing cold during the summer months, using the air conveyed by the communal ventilation. The air blown in is cooled by passing over the evaporator of the thermodynamic unit, and the heat energy is removed by the air extracted from the controlled mechanical ventilation. To improve the performance of the thermodynamic system, this installation comprises a bypass pipe between the compartments containing the evaporator and the condenser, allowing an additional flow of air that does not pass through the housing unit to pass over the condenser. That allows an increase in the thermodynamic power without adversely affecting the thermal balance of the housing unit in question.
In order not to disrupt the equilibrium of the ventilation column, mounted on the bypass pipe is a airflow passing over the evaporator, and which is moved into its closed position upon the switch to the position of maximum extraction flow rate from the kitchen.
According to an advantageous implementation of this installation, during the winter months, the condenser of the thermodynamic unit is arranged in the flow of air blown into the housing unit, and the evaporator is arranged in the flow of air extracted from the housing unit. The thermodynamic system recuperates the energy from the extracted air and uses it to heat the blown-in air. The damper on the bypass pipe is then in the closed position.
The bypass pipe may also contain a flow regulating module placed upstream or downstream of the damper. This module is intended for equalizing the flow rate in the various apartments when there is a high number of these.
Advantageously, the thermodynamic unit is of the reversible type, with the possibility of reversing the direction of refrigerant and of swapping the functions of the evaporator and of the condenser. This arrangement makes it possible, without modifying the path of the circulated air at the thermodynamic unit, to use the unit to preheat the air in the winter and to cool the air in the summer.
According to another feature of the invention, the thermodynamic unit is connected to an operating keypad and controlled by a thermostat arranged in the housing unit.
In the absence of another heating system, an optional additional heating device may be installed on the blowing side. For this, the vent openings for blowing air into the various rooms of the living quarters are equipped with an additional device for electrically heating the blown-in air, which can be operated by a temperature probe also connected to the thermodynamic unit. Depending on the requirements of the housing unit, this device may operate either only with the fresh air flow rate or with an additional air flow rate recirculated at the blowing vent aperture if the required power is too high.
Each room is therefore individually regulated at each blowing terminal. As this room-by-room regulation is connected to the thermodynamic system by the electronic management system, the overall settings can be optimized while at the same time avoiding the problems of conflicting operation between the thermodynamic system and the additional electric heating resistive elements.
The following various advantages relating to such an installation may be noted.
Air quality is guaranteed by the controlled mechanical ventilation system, with flow rates that meet the regulations and the possibility of filtering the blown-in air.
From the thermal point of view, comfort is obtained in the summer by cooling the air, by recuperation of energy from the extracted air, and in the winter by preheating the blown-in air, which leads to a saving on heating consumption. This involves individual regulation at each thermodynamic unit, with consumption metered individually and without needless thermal losses in the pipes passing through the communal parts of the building.
As far as the design of the installation is concerned, it should be noted that it is not absolutely essential for all the housing units to be equipped with a thermodynamic unit, it being possible for certain housing units to be equipped with such a unit and for other housing units to be equipped with a static exchanger, with the possibility, when desired, of replacing the static exchanger with a thermodynamic exchanger, in order to spread the investment cost,
As far as operation is concerned, it must be kept in mind that each thermodynamic module is autonomous, requires no installation of a fluid network, has no unit external to the building, as is the case with known air conditioning devices, and has no internal blower, as is the case with known ventilation devices, because the airflow rate is guaranteed by the communal controlled mechanical ventilation system of the building.